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Hellraisers Journal – Tuesday December 16, 1919
Pacific Northwest Lumber Trusts Plot Labor Frame-Up
From The New Solidarity of December 13, 1919:
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On the surface, the town of Centralia, Wash., where occurred the recent Armistice day assault on the hall of the Industrial Workers of the World, has resumed its former character of “the peaceful village,” But, under the surface, there is still much turmoil and uneasiness.
There are many guilty consciences in Centralia and the possessors of these uncomfortable appendages walk the streets in the constant dread that their crime will find them out….
But murder will out; the truth will be told; justice will be done. The facts of the Centralia affair cannot be forever concealed. Brave men will not be terrorized; honest men will not be cajoled; reasonable men will not long be duped; the guilty themselves, by the very excess of their fears, will betray their dreadful secret. And in that day of exposure the world will breathe freely once more, for villainy will be rebuked and truth and honor will be vindicated.
The members of the Industrial Workers of the World and a young attorney, resident of Centralia, are held for the murder of Warren Grimm on Nov. 11. Seven of these men are in the Lewis county jail at Chehalis, Wash., while Britt Smith, Mike Sheehan, Roy [Ray] Becker and Loren Roberts are still held in the Centralia city jail. All have been arraigned and have entered pleas of “not guilty.” They are now represented by an attorney and everything legally possible will be done to see that they shall have a fair and impartial trial. The first step in this directing was taken by filing a motion, supported by several hundred affidavits , tho change the venue from Lewis county to another county in that district….
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The reign of terror continues in the Pacific northwest. Lumber camps, unions halls and homes have been raided. The filthy bastiles of the district are filled to capacity. Big Business is giving its slaves a taste of the White Terror-just a taste; there is more coming if the slaves show a willingness to tamely submit to it. How perfectly it all worked! The Lumber Trust issued its orders for the demolition of the labor movement of the northwest; the howling Dervish of the kept press rent the air with fanatical incitations to lawless violence; the cowardly mob assembled at Centralia and succeed in its vile purpose-and in spite of an opposition justified by all the laws of God and man. A murderous gang of business men and ruffians assembled in the dead of night, as lynch mobs always do, and another champion of the cause of the solidarity of labor was left dangling to the icy stars [Wesley Everest]. Then the human bloodhounds of the master class were unleashed and hundred and hundreds more workers were thrown in dungeons…..
Herewith are the names, ages and nationalities of the original twenty-five booked at the Centralia jail as murder suspects. These were fingerprinted, examined and some released by federal officers:
Ten members of the I. W. W. have been charged with first degree murder and more may be added to this list:
O. C. Bland, Britt Smith, Mike Sheehan, Ray Becker, Jas. H. McInerney, Bert Bland, John H. Lamb, Eugene Barnett, Loren Roberts, —– Faulkner.
Fifty or more members are held at the chehalis county jail charged with criminal syndicalism…..
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SOURCES
Quote Wesley Everest, Died for my class. Chaplin Part 15
https://www.iww.org/history/library/Chaplin/centralia-conspiracy/15
The New Solidarity
(Chicago, Illinois)
-Dec 13, 1919
https://libcom.org/files/The%20New%20Solidarity%20(December%2013,%201919).pdf
https://www.sos.wa.gov/legacy/publicationsviewer/?title=New%20Solidarity&page=43&id=271
See also:
Tag: Centralia Armistice Day Conspiracy of 1919
https://weneverforget.org/tag/centralia-armistice-day-conspiracy-of-1919/
The Centralia Tragedy of 1919
Elmer Smith and the Wobblies
-by Tom Copeland
University of Washington Press, Jul 1, 2011
https://books.google.com/books?id=K8cKidBft4cC
For more cartoons by Maurice Becker, see:
Tag: Maurice Becker
https://weneverforget.org/tag/maurice-becker/
Wesley Everest
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wesley_Everest
The Centralia Conspiracy
-by Ralph Chaplin
Seattle, 1920
https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=hvd.32044019248947&view=2up&seq=6
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Ralph Chaplin – Bars And Shadows, The Prison Poems; Mourn Not The Dead